Digital distribution of video games will completely replace retail in the next 5 − 20 years. Karl Slatoff, the president of Take-Two Interactive publishing house, thinks so.
He said this at the annual Credit Suisse media conference held in Arizona last weekend.
“I can’t say exactly when we will fully switch to digital sales. But it’s bound to happen, this is the spirit of the times, and everything is moving in this direction,” Slatoff said.
According to Karl Slatoff, the digitalization of game sales is actively developing thanks to the Xbox Live and PSN services. At the same time, the businessman for some reason did not mention Steam.
At the same time, the head of Take-Two admitted that the industry is still heavily dependent on physical sales, and the company “does everything that depends on it for the sake of maintaining partners in retail.”
Slatoff also noted that the shift towards digital sales allows developers to introduce new ways to monetize games, such as loot boxes and in-game transactions.
Commenting on Electronic Arts’ recent problems with society’s reaction to loot boxes in the online shooter Star Wars Battlefront II, Slatoff said that gamers turned against EA not because of transactions per se, but because of the quality of the game itself.
Karl added that he personally does not consider loot boxes to be a type of gambling, since players in any case get some content from them for their money.
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